Sword of Sorcery‘s cancellation was recently announced. I can’t say I’m particularly surprised, as I’ve heard that the sales on the title were not good. I wonder if it would have done better at a lower price point without being split into a shorter main story + backup story. I really wish that DC had developed more of an all-ages title built around the cartoon shorts, because they really have that extra spark that could inspire more fans. Sword of Sorcery I was reading just out of a general sense of resignation because I wanted to see what would happen with this revised Amethyst character.

I really like this version of the Gemworld, with everything in it being animate and talking. It seems like a nice way of calling back to the original series art, where so many random things had faces. This just appeals to me so much more than the Sword of Sorcery reboot. The animated Amethyst is a different version, but it just seems so much more in keeping with the intent of the original comic series

Well, it took me a bit to get all the metadata in my Goodreads account in order to get some decent numbers but I fixed the issues. The irony of a librarian having insufficient Goodreads metadata is not lost on me. So, for 2012, I read 167 total volumes counting both books and manga/graphic novels. I’m going to round up that a bit to account for manga ebooks (from Jmanga) that aren’t listed on Goodreads, so it was probably closer to 175-180, really. I read roughly 75 volumes of manga. I’m estimated roughly 90-100 books, and the reason why that total is so high is due to the high percentage of fluffy romance series that I can tear through in a very short amount of time. I’ve also been reading more and more ebooks, which I think I tend to read a bit faster than print.

Favorite book I read this year:

The Sisters Brothers by Patrick Dewitt – This Cohen Brothersesque novel about two assassins during the Gold Rush was so good, it totally spoiled me for reading for a long time because absolutely nothing else could measure up to it. The dialog and use of language was spectacular, and the combination of violence, humor, and unlikely adventure gave it the feeling of an unlikely epic.

Best Manga I should have read a long time ago

Co-hosting the Takehiko Inoue manga moveable feast was great, because I finally got around to reading parts of Slam Dunk and Real. Inoue’s sports manga is just as fantastic as Vagabond.

As much as I enjoyed Saga, reading the first couple volumes of Mark Waid’s Daredevil was such a fresh take on the character, I’m going to have to go with this, both in visual execution and the fun of seeing Daredevil not act like the Marvel Universe’s Prince of Gloom.

Most Underwhelming Comic Reboot:

I wouldn’t expect that a new Amethyst of Princess of Gemworld series would leave me largely indifferent but after looking forward to it with guarded optimism, I was just generally disappointed by the Amethyst reboot. The occasional cute character moments and humor don’t really make up for the rapes as narrative device and shuffled reenvisioning of the Gemworld.

Notable Romance novels

This was the year I read most of Courtney Milan’s books. I also enjoyed reading Thea Harrison’s Elder Races series and Tessa Dare’s Spindle Cove series.

Favorite YA

John Green’s The Fault in Our Stars and Maggie Stiefvater’s The Scorpio Races were my favorite YA reads.

This is just as cute, adorable, and Gemworldish as I was hoping. I’m going to just pretend that the Sword of Sorcery comic isn’t really happening, because if Amethyst had to be rebooted, Magical Girl Amethyst seems so much closer to the spirit of the original series.

Also, so enjoyed seeing mini video game Prince Topaz get promptly killed by Dark Opal. Seriously, why couldn’t we have had a comic book to tie in to the animated short?